There are quite a few players who can leverage early advantages to their favor without any impunity, and these are the same players who made mistakes during their first few gaming sessions.
I created the top 10 early game mistakes to avoid in Rise of Kingdoms. It’s your opportunity to break the cycle and do it right the first time.
During the early phase, making the right moves can play a significant role in how fast you will progress.
Here are my top 10 early game mistakes to avoid in Rise of Kingdoms. So be sure to grab a cup of coffee, study, learn and master these tips to gain an edge over your opponents from the beginning.
1. Star Upgrading Commanders too Early
One of the most significant early-game mistakes you could be making is star upgrading your commanders without fully understanding your civilizations’ traits.
For instance, Germany is fantastic at dealing extra damage with cavalry, but Hermann is your starting commander who specializes in archers.
Thus, you probably would be better off investing universal sculptures and starlight sculptures in commanders with cavalry such as Baibars and Cao Cao as their talent builds allow them to maximize the trait bonus.
Study the civilization you plan to play, understand their traits so you can plan, and choose the right commander to stick around because you will play with them for quite a long time.
2. Not Prioritizing Commander Talent Points Right
Again, one of the early game mistakes is not investing your commander’s talent points correctly. To maximize your commander’s talent tree, you need to put them in areas that will work well with their skills and troops.
Here at House of Kingdoms, we have an entire list of commanders with their own recommended talent builds.
In addition, some commanders have at least 2 to 3 recommended talent builds, which you can customize to work around with your preferences and maximize your overall combat effectiveness.
Before you put a point in any of these talent trees, make sure you know how you plan to use your commanders.
Resetting or changing your talent build costs a hefty 1,000 gems, and you will want to avoid using your gems at all prices! Unless you are willing to farm gems yourself.
3. Making a Legendary Commander your Primary Commander
Now, this isn’t always an early game mistake in some cases. Depending on which legendary commanders are recommended and how much you are going to spend on them. However, most of the time, it is just a simple game mistake.
The smart move to do is focus on your epic commanders first, before you touch your legendary commanders. Ensure sure you know what you are doing.
Elite gathering commanders like Sarka, Constance, and Gaius Marius are some of the few commanders that everyone should be leveling up early in the game, so you have solid gathering teams for resources.
Your Epic Commander(s) should be your primary commanders and use them to make progress in essential game modes such as Expedition Mode and chain-farming barbarians.
4. Choosing the Wrong Civilization
Don’t get me wrong, all civilizations are great, and some of them are very fun to play. But if you choose a civilization that doesn’t line up well with your gameplay, you lose out on a potential boost.
For instance, Japan is great at scouting due to its 30% march speed. Therefore, you should be sending out your scouts 24/7 to lift all the fog. But what about planning to launch an attack while playing as Japan? You are going to lose that one out badly.
If you want to play offensively, you would be better off with the Vikings as your starting civilization. You will get Bjorn Ironside as your starting commander, and he is one of the strongest epic commanders for free-to-play players.
Germany and Arabia are outstanding for PvP due to their traits. They are great for bloodthirsty players, too. So, make sure you pick the proper civilization that is going to fit your gameplay strategy. Plus, you get a free civilization change as you upgrade your City Hall to Level 10.
5. Wasting Your Gems at Mysterious Shop
Occasionally Mysterious Merchant will drop by in your city to offer you lucrative deals. If you are just starting, don’t waste your gems at the shop just yet.
Focus on upgrading your VIP to Level 6 first so that you get to unlock permanent second builder and bonuses.
Afterward, you can continue upgrading your VIP Level or spend your gems at the shop and the Gems Store. I like to invest all of the gems in upgrading my VIP Level Status towards 13 / 14 for more bonuses and better daily chest quality.
As for spending your gems at the shop, go for 70% off, which is ok-ok. However, items that are 80% are infrequent and worth snatching!
A smart thing to do with your gems would be to spend during the More than Gems event. Every time you spend your gems, whether towards your VIP level or in the Gems Store, you will get many rewards.
Save your gems in advance when the event comes to maximize your rewards.
6. Not Deciding Which to Jump or Not to Jump
Did you know that you can jump to another kingdom while your city hall is at Level 7? Thus, jumping can give you an early head start advantage.
However, if you are new to Rise of Kingdoms, I recommend playing the game first to understand the mechanisms fully.
When you create a new character in a different kingdom, you need to plan it out. If your goal is just to grow, then move to another kingdom via jumping.
Just max out your City Hall at Level 7, all buildings to Level 7, research technologies to the max, and just train your troops.
When you start a new character, you have ten days to jump to a new kingdom with a beginner’s teleport.
Once ten days expire, you lose the ability to jump. If you level up your City Hall to 8, you also lose the ability to jump. So be prepared to jump on the 8th or 9th day to a new kingdom.
7. Doing too Many Things at Once
Spreading yourself out too thin is often one of the early game mistakes that new players make in Rise of Kingdoms. You have your gathering commanders out there on the map harvesting resources. But you don’t have any troops to defend your city.
And what happens next? Someone saw that you left yourself exposed? They launch attacks and steal all of your hard-earned resources.
These problems are less likely if you join one of these top alliances and are grouped up with your alliance members. However, if you are out in the wide-open field — they are wild, and you better keep your guard up.
Have some troops to defend your city while your commanders gather resources. Don’t focus on too many commanders at once, or you risk spreading yourself too thin, leaving low-level commanders unable to defend themselves against high-powered players.
Focus on one commander at a time. It’s the easiest and fastest way to level up your commanders. Plus, you will grow in power fast, which is essential if you want to dominate your opponents on the battlefield.
8. Not Buying Legendary Commander Pack
Here’s one legendary commander pack that I highly recommend buying, and it’s called “Writers of History.” That pack alone is worth 66,375 gems, and you can buy it just for five dollars. Yup, you heard it right. Five. Dollars. A. Pack.
Every time you summon a brand new legendary commander, you will get this special offer that lasts only an hour.
If you are F2P, this isn’t a mistake. However, if you plan to spend a little, you will end up regretting not buying them right off the bat.
Think about this one, it is only five dollars, and it easily beat every other pack in the Gems Store. I would highly recommend getting the Writers of History pack for any free-to-play players.
9. Attacking Other Players Early
I don’t recommend attacking other players early in the game. It is a fast way to lose the game, taint your reputation in your kingdoms, and make many enemies.
Troops in Rise of Kingdoms isn’t precisely the same as other games. They are harder to kill, and defenders always have a defensive advantage because their troops don’t die while the attacker loses more soldiers.
Unless you want to drop your shield early, in the beginning, the only thing you should be doing is scouting the map and gathering intelligence of your kingdom so that you can plan.
Save attacking another player’s city at a later time when you have stronger troops and enough firepower to crush them without risking your troops that much.
If you want to start attacking other players early in the game, I recommend joining an alliance then assembly a rally with your alliance members.
Rally commanders excel at dealing massive damage and usually take few losses compared to attacking other players all by yourself.
10. Playing Alone
Rise of Kingdoms is a massively multiplayer real-time strategy, and you are going to get pit against hundreds and hundreds of players in your kingdom. Playing alone will get you attacked all the time despite resources or to show their alpha status.
You need to join top alliances ranked between 1 to 10. You will be surprised by how welcoming they are to take you in quickly.
As an alliance member, you get the perks of being protected, accelerated farming, alliance technologies that improve your building speeds, production, troops attack/defense, and more.
Plus, you get alliance bonuses via Monument if your alliance takes control of passes, shrines, and temples. If you play alone, you miss out on all these awesome perks and bonuses that alliances reap!
Conclusion of Top 10 Early Mistakes to Avoid
Now you know the top 10 early game mistakes to avoid whenever you start on a new kingdom server. With this knowledge you have now, playing the game as a free-to-play player will be a lot easier now.
As always, make sure you head over to our Rise of Kingdoms Gift Code guide to check for free rewards in-game. Suppose you are currently playing the game on your phone or tablet. We recommend download Rise of Kingdoms for PC.
It runs a lot smoother, faster, has higher graphic quality, and can handle massive battles during the Lost Kingdom event. I hope you found this guide informative and helpful.
If you have any questions or have a suggestion to make, let us know by commenting in the comment section below. We are looking forward to hearing from you soon!
Happy ruling, Governors!
